10. Callum #3
It’s freezing! Every single nerve ending I own turns into an ice cube. My lungs seize up, and I can’t breathe. Everything is shock and arctic water and the muffled sound of nothing.
I surface, gasping for air, and push my hair out of my eyes. I am still somehow holding onto the rod.
“CAL!” Wesley’s leaning over the side, his face frantic.
Roman is completely losing it.
Full-body, bent-over, can’t-catch-his-breath laughing.
“IT’S NOT FUCKING FUNNY!” I shout, but I feel a laugh of my own bubbling up. I start to tread water, hauling the rod with me. My clothes are immediately heavy, pulling me down. My jacket is soaked through, and my boots feel like anchors.
“It’s a little funny!” Roman wheezes, wiping actual tears from his eyes.
The rod jerks again in my hands. Whatever’s on the line is still fighting. I pull at it and continue swimming one handed, which is every bit as impossible as it sounds.
“Let it go!” Wesley reaches down, hand extended.
“Absolutely not!” I’m not losing this fish after it pulled me into the Pacific Ocean in March. “This damn fish pulled me into the ocean. This just became personal.”
Wesley leans farther over, his fingers grabbing at air. “Callum, let go of the damn rod and grab my hand.”
“Not until I —”
The rod jerks so hard I go under again, swallowing a full mouthful of water, and then the line goes completely slack.
The fish is gone.
I surface, sputtering. “Dammit.”
Roman is sitting on the deck now, full-on crying with laughter. “That was — I can’t —” He can’t even finish the sentence, just waves his hand in the general direction of where I fell in, tears streaming down his face.
“Are you done?” I chuckle, spitting out seawater, my teeth already chattering.
“Not even close. That was the most —” He dissolves into laughter again.
Wesley hauls me back into the boat, and I collapse onto the deck in a puddle, completely soaked, freezing, still holding a rod with absolutely nothing on it. There’s seaweed in my collar. And hair in my eyes. My dignity is somewhere at the bottom of the Pacific.
I stare up at the gray sky for a moment, dazed.
Then I start laughing too, and once I start I can’t stop, and the three of us just absolutely lose it together on the deck of the boat like absolute idiots.
Because it is ridiculous. All of it. I got pulled into the cold ocean by a fish.
A fish that is now somewhere down there, completely fine, probably telling all its fish friends about the idiot it just dunked.
Roman is never going to let me live this down.
I’m going to be eighty years old, and he’s going to bring this up at my funeral.
“That was the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen.” Roman gasps between laughs. “You went full cartoon character. Just —” He makes a gesture, miming someone getting yanked overboard. “Right over the side. Didn’t even have time to let go of the rod.”
“I wasn’t letting that fish win.”
“Cal.” He looks at me with genuine sympathy. “The fish definitely won, man.”
Wesley goes below deck and reappears with a towel, his shoulders shaking with suppressed laughter. “You okay?”
“I’m fine.” I’m shaking so hard I can barely hold the towel. My fingers are numb. My lips are probably blue. “Freezing. But fine.”
I strip off my soaked jacket, my flannel, and my t-shirt. Everything is drenched and heavy with seawater. I towel off as best I can, but my jeans are still plastered to my legs like a second skin.
“We should probably head back,” Wesley says. “You’re going to catch a cold.”
Always the big brother.
“No way.” I’m still shivering hard enough that my teeth are clattering, but I mean it. I’ll warm up eventually. “We’ve got at least four more hours. I’m not going back empty-handed.”
“You’re soaked.”
“I’ll dry.” I wring out my t-shirt over the side, watching the water stream out. “Besides, I have a reputation to restore. I can’t let that fish have the last word. I won’t be able to live with myself.”
Roman grins. “That’s the spirit.”
Wesley shakes his head, but he’s smiling. He disappears below deck again and comes back with a dry hoodie. “Here. It’s gonna be big on you.”
Wesley’s got at least four inches on me, but it’s warm and dry, and I pull it on without a single complaint.
I hang my wet clothes over the side of the boat to drip, but I keep my jeans on. I’ve lost enough dignity for one day. Then grab my rod and bait a new hook with trembling hands. It takes me four attempts. Roman watches with barely contained glee.
“Ready?” I ask.
“You’re crazy,” Roman says, but he’s already moving back to his own rod.
The adrenaline is fading now, leaving me loose and almost giddy, and I realize I can’t remember the last time I laughed like that. Not the tired exhale I pass off as laughing at the end of a long day. When was the last time something was just stupid and ridiculous and genuinely funny?
We settle back into fishing. The water is choppy, white caps forming on the waves, but Wesley navigates it easily, moving us to a different spot directly in the sun.
Roman catches a lingcod. Wesley pulls in two more rockfish. I catch nothing, but I keep trying, my line going out and coming back empty.
We spend the next few hours in comfortable silence, broken only by the occasional comment about a catch or a joke from Roman. The sun climbs higher, warming my back through Wesley’s hoodie.
By early afternoon, my jeans are mostly dry, my mood is lighter, and the cooler is respectably full.
Wesley checks his watch. “We should start heading back. Got that halibut you wanted to prep for tomorrow?”
“Yeah.” I’d almost forgotten about the restaurant and everything waiting for me back on land.
But right now, I’m not ready to let go of this feeling.
I feel light and happy for the first time in a while.
This was a reminder that I have people who show up for me and pull me back into the boat when I fall overboard.
People who sit with me in the cold and let me work through my shit without judgment.
“Thanks,” I say as Wesley starts the engine. “For today. For getting me out here.”
“Anytime,” Wesley says simply.
“Yeah,” Roman adds, moving to help coil the lines. “Though next time, maybe we leave the dramatic swimming to the fish.”
“Not funny.”
“Still a little funny.”
I flip him off, but I’m grinning.
We motor back toward the harbor, the sun starting its descent toward the horizon. The water is calmer here, protected by the breakwater, and the town comes into view gradually.
Home.
Wesley docks the boat, and we start unloading the catch. The rhythmic work is soothing: passing coolers, hosing down the deck, securing the lines.
By the time we’re done, the sun is painting everything gold. My arms ache in a good way, and my face feels windburned. I smell like fish and salt water, and I couldn’t care less.
“Same time next month?” Roman asks, shouldering his bag.
“You even have to ask?”
“Just checking. In case you developed a fear of the ocean. Or fish specifically. Fish-related trauma is very real, Chef. That would be tragic for you.”
“Get out of here.”
“I’m just saying. No shame in it. The fish started it.”
“Roman.”
“Gone.” He holds up both hands. “I’m gone.”
His laugh follows him all the way to his car, loud enough that a couple walking their dog on the dock turns to look.
Wesley and I finish securing The Daily Catch in silence.
“You good?” he asks finally, straightening up.
“Yeah.” And I mean it for the first time in a long time. “I’m good.”
“You need anything, you call. Doesn’t matter what time.”
“I know.”
He claps me on the shoulder once, then heads toward his truck.
I pull myself up into my truck. Everything hurts in that satisfying way that comes from a day of hard work, being outside, and doing something that has nothing to do with failing restaurants or complicated feelings.
I pull out of the marina parking lot and head toward the restaurant. My apartment is right above it, and I need a shower before I do anything else.
But as I’m driving, passing the familiar streets of downtown Westerly Point, I think about what Wesley and Roman said.
I need to let her carry whatever she’s carrying without making it heavier.
Tomorrow, I’ll try to be better. I’ll try to be less of the angry, bitter guy who’s been making everyone miserable.
Tomorrow, I’ll try to remember that whatever Vivienne’s going through, it’s not about me. And maybe if I can give her the space she needs, she’ll eventually trust me enough to let me in.
But tonight, I’m just going to go upstairs, take the hottest shower of my life, and sleep for ten hours.
It’s a start.